DEFICIENCIES IN OUR HISTORY 



AN 

ADDRESS 

DELIVERED BEFORE THE 

VERMONT HISTORICAL 

AND 

ANTIQUARIAN SOCIETY, 

AT MONTPELIER. 

OCTOBER 16, 1846. 

With an appendix containing the charter, constitu- 
tion AND BY-LAWS OF THE SOCIETY. THE VERMONT 
declaration of INDEPENDENCE, JANUARY I5TH. 1777, 
THE PROCEEDINGS OF THE CONVENTION, 4TH OF JUNE, 
1777. AND THE "SONG OF THE VERMONTERS." IN 1779. 



BY JAMES DAVIE BUTLER. 
Professor in Norwich University. 



MONTPELIER: 

EASTMAN AND DANFORTH. 
1846. 



A r 



Deficiencies in our History 



NOTE 

In issuing this reprint the original pamphlet has been followed 
and the list of names, p. 37-38, is given without change, though it 
contains many typographical errors. See Vt. Governor and Council 
V. I note page 57. 

The "Vermont Declaration of Independence " was published in the 
Connecticut Courant, No. 634, March 17, 1777 (see v. 1 Vermont 
Governor & Council p. 50 and note p. 57 ). 

On page 34, in a note signed C. G. E. ( Chas. G. Eastman ), it is 
stated that "the following declaration and accompanying papers were 
found by Mr. Stevens at Washington." This seems to indicate that at 
the time this pamphlet was printed ( 1846) the original draft of the 
Vermont Declaration of Independence was extant. 

The conventions of January and June, 1777, appointed committees 
to draft the declaration and other papers here set forth and directed 
that they should be printed in the newspapers, and they did in fact 
appear in the Connecticut Courant in 1 777. In the fac-simile reprint 
of " Early Vermont Conventions, 1 775-1 777 ", so carefully edited by 
the Hon. Redfield Proctor in 1 904, on page 1 4, the conclusion is 
reached that the Dr. Jonas Fay records are " the original and official 
record of the proceedings of these meetings or conventions." Is it not 
possible that among the papers referred to by Mr. Eastman as having 
been found by Mr. Stevens at Washington was the original draft 
of the Vermont Declaration of Independence made by the committees 
under order of the conventions and furnished to the Connecticut 
Courant for publication ? This declaration is an important State docu- 
ment and if in existence should be secured and placed in the State 
archives, where the original records of the convention that adopted the 
Declaration are now deposited. 

E. M. G. 



Deficiencies in our History 

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DEFICIENCIES IN OUR HISTORY 



AN 



ADDRESS 



DELIVERED BEFORE THE 



VERMONT HISTORICAL 



AND 



ANTIQUARIAN SOCIETY, 

AT MONTPELIER, 

OCTOBER 16, 1846. 



BY JAMES DAVIE BUTLER, 
Professor in Norwich University. 



MONTPELIER : 

EASTMAN AND DANFORTH. 

1846. 



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Of this pamphlet there have been printed three hundred 

copies at the Elm Tree Press, Woodstock, Vermont, for 

Edward M. Goddard 

1910 



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ADDRESS. 



Fellow Citizens of Vermont : 

The life of old nations is memory. In the old world travellers daily 
behold great events and the scenes of them — not only commemorated 
by monuments, but canonized by chapels and altars. 

Young nations live in hope rather than in memory. ( While pressing 
forw^ard to those things which are before, they forget those which are 
behind.) This truth finds many exemplifications in our history. 

A circular was recently sent to every town in Vermont that was 
incorporated when our State independence was declared, requesting 
information concerning the 7 1 signers of that declaration. It was 
vouchsafed only one answer. Our declaration of State independence 
was never published in this State until last summer, and then only in 
fugitive newspapers. The papers of our first and most memorable 
Governor were sold to a pedlar with paper rags. 

TTie cannon taken (in defence of our frontier) at Bennington lie 
unclaimed at Washington. The maps, captured at the same place, 
were used as curtains until all, save one, perished. The grenadiers' 
arms and drum there taken, and presented as a trophy to our State 
council were received with a promise that, according to the donor's 
request they should be kept in the council-chamber as a memorial to 
the glorious action fought at Wallumscoik. But this trophy has been 
vilely thrown away. 

Properly speaking we have no rostrum. A rostrum is a speaker's 
stand begirt with memorials of vanquished foes. We have none. 

Facts such as these prepare us to expect a universal apathy in regard 
to our history, and move our special wonder that we can boast so 
many historians, and several worthy of no common praise. 

It is no great discredit to our historians that they are in many respects 



deficient, since they were forced to make brick without straw, the 
collections needful for the adequate execution of their task, which are 
still imperfect, not having been fairly begun, when most of our 
chroniclers wrote. 

It is simply because no one else could be found to stand in the gap, 
that I venture to appear before you at this time, inasmuch as I must 
appear to the same disadvantage with our historians. 1 have, indeed, 
had access to sources of knowledge which were hid from their eyes ; 
but I have enjoyed this privilege only a few days, and under the 
double pressure of ministerial and professional labors, as well as with 
one foot on the cradle, in the judgment of many a much greater 
impediment. 

The subject which I would invite you to consider, is certain 
deficiencies in our State histories. 

The controversy of Vermont with New York has never been 
described as its merits, and the richness of materials regarding it, 
demand. I have drawn up a list — which, pardon me, I do not mean 
to read — of fifty questions concerning it which demand elucidation. 
No historian hints — what every historian should have clearly shown — 
that that struggle was not merely about the price of land, but a conflict 
between New England and New York principles — those of the 
Puritan and of the Patroon ; — between our township system, with 
local elections and taxes, and New York centralization. 

I am constrained to pass in utter silence, however, the manifold 
short-comings of our writers in respect to our relations to all our sister 
States. 

The part Vermont took in the Revolution is rather shadowed forth 
than distinctly traced by our historians. 

They claim for us indeed a share in the taking of Ticonderoga, as 
well as in the siege of St. Johns ; in the battle near Bennington, and 
perhaps in the taking of Burgoyne. 

But, though much is said of battles as far off as Braddock's defeat, 
instead of a distinctive account of Vermont's military career, her 
exploits are so blended with those of the continentals, or so imperfectly 
detailed, as to lose all individuality. 

As to the capture of Ticonderoga, it is said, men from Connecticut 
came to Vermont to engage Ethan Allen in the business. It is not 



hinted that Allen had ever before thought of such a project, even in 
his dreams. What is the fact ? Allen's owrn testimony is, that when the 
men from Connecticut arrived in Bennington, he and other officers of 
the Green Mountain Boys were already deliberating upon a project 
for surprising that fortress ; though whether such a measure would be 
agreeable to Congress or not, they could not for certain determine. 

A full month before any step was taken in Connecticut, for seizing 
Ticonderoga, an agent, recently dispatched through Vermont to 
Montreal, thus wrote the committee of correspondence in Boston : 

"March 29, 1775. 

"One thing I must mention to be kept as a profound secret. The 
port of Ticonderoga must be seized as soon as possible, should 
hostilities be committed by the king's troops. The people of the New 
Hampshire Grants have engaged to do this business ; and, in my 
opinion, they are the most proper persons for this job." 

" This will effectually curb this province, and all the troops that may 
be sent here." 

This last particular, the importance of Ticonderoga as the key alike 
of New England and Canada; the usefulness of the cannon there 
taken, at the siege of Boston and elsewhere ; its having been thought 
worth sacrificing thousands of lives ; its being surprised by men destitute 
of bayonets, of a single bayonet, — are particulars which one wonders 
our historians have not made more prominent, since all but one-sixth 
of those, who effected the surprise, were Green Mountain Boys, and 
this was the first offensive exploit in the war of our Independence. 

The readiness of the Vermonters for the Revolution, even before 
hostilities began, is indubitable, but is not made manifest in our 
histories. 

Among Slade's State papers, indeed, there is an assurance from 
the Vermonters given to New Hampshire and Massachusetts four 
weeks before the affray at Lexington, that " they shall always be ready 
for aid and assistance to those States, if, by the dispensations of 
Providence, they should be called thereto." I have found no allusion 
to this assurance in any history. 

But the preparation of heart in Vermont for hostilities is attested by 
more particular evidence even than this. Seven weeks before the 1 9th 
of April, Ethan Allen wrote a leading man in Connecticut, promising 



8 

a regiment oi Green Mountain Boys in case of war. This letter is still 
extant in manuscript. 

More than half a year before the war of the Revolution began, a 
rumor that the British had slain six men, and seized a depot of powder, 
electrified New England. A chronicler of those times says: "The 
heads of the Bennington body, of 2000 armed men, forthwith gave 
out orders that they should get ready to march." 

Allow me next a glance at the invasion of Canada. None of our 
later historians give due credit to the diplomatic address of our Fay and 
Ira Allen, which contributed to the capture of the British fleet. After 
the fall of Montgomery, General Wooster, who was sent for, to the 
command of the forces besieging Quebec, in despair of other assistance, 
wrote thus to Warner in Vermont : ( 2, 1 62 : ) " Let me beg of you 
to collect immediately as many men as you can, and somehow get into 
this country, and stay with us till we can have relief from the colonies. 
Let your men be sent on by tens, twenties, thirties, forties or fifties, as 
they can be collected." Within eleven days from the writing of this 
letter at Montreal, in the dead of winter. Green Mountain Boys were 
on their march for Quebec. In about two months the force of effective 
men before that city was almost doubled by reinforcements under 
Warner. But for this seasonable relief, the retreat from Canada might 
have been a rout, or our whole army there have been forced to 
capitulate, (or, to use a phrase very common soon after, might have 
been Burgoyned.) 

Some of our histories mention the arrival of twenty-seven men from 
Massachusetts before Quebec. They are all silent respecting — what 
it much more behoved them to relate — ten times as many recruits from 
our own State. Nor do they, with one exception, so much as once 
mention the name of Warner in all their notices of the vmter campaign 
in Canada. 

In relation to Allen's attack on Montreal, our historians say that 
Brown was, by some means, prevented from co-operating with Allen 
as he had agreed to do. The question, by what means, still remains 
unanswered. The answer to it might show that the blame of Allen's 
finding captivity for himself, when he sought the capture of Montreal, 
is not to be charged solely to his own fool-hardiness. 

Our State histories say nothing of the supplies forwarded from 




nil 

014 042 842 5 

Bennington to Ticonderoga, in 1 776, at a time when, out ror sucn 

assistance, that fortress might have been lost. 

The next day, after receiving a call for flour, the Committee 
ansv^ered, that, without an hour's delay, they had sought for wheat, 
and found 1 000 bushels ; would send on what was ground forthwith, 
and the rest as soon as it could be manufactured. They add these words 
to the commander at Ticonderoga : " It is difficult to transport what we 
have already on hand ; for our militia, even before we received your 
letter asking assistance, left us almost to a man, marched, and have 
doubtless joined you before this. 

This relief was afforded at a crisis when the lories about Albany cut 
off all hopes of succor from that quarter, and when the troops at 
Ticonderoga had bread but for sixteen days, and were expecting to 
be blockaded. 

Our historians say that on the evacuation of Ticonderoga, our 
Council of Safety resolved to raise all the troops they could to act 
against Burgoyne. 

None of them, however, save Ira Allen, tell us how, with an empty 
treasury, they could raise an army, as it were, by a itamp of the foot. 
The secret of this miracle — a regiment made ready for war in a 
fortnight — was an expedient proposed by Ira Allen himself, ( at sun- 
rise, after a night spent in devising ways and means ), namely : to 
confiscate instantly all the property of all tories, except such articles as 
humanity required for their families. 

But even Allen fails to bring out fully the alacrity and energy of our 
fathers during this critical campaign. A man in Connecticut writes that 
agents of Vermont had to come thither to buy arms to the amount of 
£4000 ; and, failing to obtain them, had gone further — with what 
success is to this day unknown. The militia of this State were chiefly 
at Ticonderoga, yet Warner writes : " I should be glad if a few hills 
of corn unhoed should not be a motive sufficient to detain men at 
home". Such was the rally that St. Clair, a few days after, writes 
thus : " The Vermont Convention have given such proofs of their 
readiness to concur in any measure for the public safety that it would 
be impertinent to press them now. 

Our historians would have made it plainer what part Vermont had 
in the taking of Burgoyne, if they had described more fully how 



10 

sacrificingly she removed or destroyed all crops, cattle, and carriages, 
that were in danger of being seized for his use, and thus took off his 
chariot wheels. They might have shown the revolution in Burgoyne's 
feelings effected by the battle of Bennington, and the part Vermont 
was thought by him to have played in that action, had they contrasted 
two of his letters, one written just before, the other just after that 
battle. Aug. 1 2 he writes to the commander of the expedition against 
Vermont : " Try the affections of the country — cross the mountains to 
Rockingham and Brattleboro — bring me 1 300 horses or more." Did 
he know by instinct that this State was a nursery of good horses ? 

August 20, eight days afterwards, he writes: "The Hampshire 
grants in particular, a country unpeopled and almost unknown in the 
last war, now abounds in the most active and most rebellious race 
of the continent, and hangs like a gathering storm upon my left." 

Truly he needed not send again to try the affections of such a 
country ! 

The exertions of Vermont against Burgoyne are liable to be under- 
rated, because our histories pass in silence the false rumors which then 
extensively prevailed, and had all the effect of realities. Ticonderoga 
was evacuated by unanimous vote of a full council of war. It was 
reported by more than one that he could tell when that fortress was 
sold, and for how much. One hundred and twenty-eight cannon were 
there lost. This number was exaggerated to 300. No artillery men 
were there slain or captured. It was rumored that none of them 
escaped. The British built no fortifications in Castleton, nor were they 
there in great force. But the rumor was that 3000 and then 6000 
of them were fortifying there, and that with cannon. They never, 
unless by scouts, penetrated further east than Castleton. Tidings crossed 
the mountain announcing, first, that they were at Rutland, then nine 
miles east of it on the road to No. 4, and still pushing on. Burgoyne 
never sent a detachment against any place north of Rockingham. 
Common fame declared his myrmidons on their march for Royalton 
and Newbury. Contemporaries speak of this rumor — driving families 
by scores, and cattle by hundreds, to flee across the Connecticut. No 
diversion in Burgoyne's favor was attempted at Boston : he had no 
intention to cross New England to Boston ; but both these schemes 
were firmly believed by not a few. 



It 

Amid rumors such as these, and perhaps others more appalling, the 
memory of which may have perished, men's hearts failing them for 
looking after those things which were coming, the Green Mountain 
Boys heard a voice ringing in their ears — 

" Leave the harvest to perish on the field where it grows, 
And the reaping of wheat for the reaping of foes : " 

and they were deaf to all other voices. 

In describing the operations at Lake George landing, by which the 
vessels, in which Burgoyne might have retreated, were captured, both 
Williams and Thompson leave Warner's name unmentioned. But 
Warner was the commander of that expedition, (3.729.) Those 
whose names are mentioned — Brown, Woodbridge and Johnson — 
were his subalterns. 

Henick, who was at the head of the Green Mountain Rangers in 
this expedition, is also passed in silence by our best historians, though 
he was honored with a special letter of thanks, not only from the 
Vermont council, but from General Gates at the head of the continental 
army. 

Reading Williams' history in boyhood, I used to wonder what 
became of that thorn in our side — the British garrison in Ticonderoga 
— after Burgoyne's surrender. I have not found what I sought in any 
other historian. The fact is, that that garrison retreated into Canada ; 
but not without forty-nine men of their rear, as well as horses, cattle, 
and boats, in great numbers, being taken by fifty Vermont Rangers. 
Forty-nine regulars taken by fifty militia. A fact like this is worth 
something to an advocate for the efficiency of militia. 

Such were the exertions of Vermont, during this campaign, as to 
prevent the Council from getting the new-made constitution printed, 
(3. 84 1 . ) Other results of the campaign are thus stated by Gov. 
Chittenden : 

" Though there were plentiful crops on the ground, the inhabitants 
were prevented from securing any considerable part of them. Before 
they left the service against Burgoyne, the season was so far advanced 
as to put it out of their power to make preparations for a crop of 
winter grain on which they had ever had the greatest dependence. 
TTie principal part of them, therefore, are reduced to an Indian cake, 



12 

in scant proportion to the number of their families. Their sheep and 
flax having been destroyed by the enemy, or having otherwise perished, 
their bellies and backs are become co-sufferers." 

" In this deplorable situation they remain firm and unshaken ; and, 
being generally well armed and accoutered, are ready in any emergency, 
and on the shortest notice, to face and encounter their inveterate foe — 
undaunted. " 

There is much history, of the domestic or defensive military prepara- 
tions of Vermont, yet unprinted. 

Fragmentary notices of forts are, indeed, scattered through our 
Gazetteer, under the words Hubbardton, Pittsford, Rutland, Castle- 
ton, Bethel, &c. But the system, of which they were a part, is not 
explained in our histories. There are manuscript records — of head- 
quarters in Rutland, often garrisoned by hundreds, — of branch-forts 
with palisades or pickets, flankers and barracks for 150 men, — of 
scouts reconnoitering the woods, passing from fort to fort, seizing 
suspected persons, helping or forcing bold settlers to remove within 
the lines of defense, — destroying such crops as they could not secure 
from the enemy, and continuing their excursions even in winter on 
snowshoes. 

In this service, it is recorded that one-sixth part of the able-bodied 
men ( on an average, one from every family ) were at times, employed. 
When special danger was apprehended, reinforcements were for- 
warded on horseback. Enlistments were encouraged by the bounty of 
a township of land for each company. Provisions were obtained by 
requiring each town to send on thirty pounds of pork with each 
recruit — by issuing press- warrants for horses and empty bags, and by 
causing the highway tax to be worked out as early as possible, to 
facilitate the transportation of supplies. 

Pittsford was not, as has been supposed, always the most northern 
post. In March and April, I 778, a considerable force was posted in 
New Haven, (4. 73.) This may have been one of the new line of 
forts which Vermont was engaged in erecting when Congress with- 
drew all the national spades and pickaxes, and the enemy's vessels 
were cruising on the lake. 

Particulars such as these are not the pomp and pride of war ; but 
they are worthy to be known, though unrecorded by our historians. 



13 

Let us next remark certain deficiencies in our histories with regard 
to the tories — the worst foes of our fathers. 

From the best histories of Vermont one would scarcely believe 
there was such a class of men, for their name is seldom mentioned — 
never by Thompson, with manifest reference to Vermont. Doubtless 
they were fewer than the British hoped when they struggled so per- 
severingly, by threats and promises, to make Vermont a crown- 
province — and than Governor Morris feared, when he thus wrote to 
Congress, (3. 319:) " Disagreeable as it may be to tell or to hear 
this truth, yet a truth it is, that very many of those villains — the Ver- 
monters — only want a New England reason, or, if you like the 
expression better, a plausible pretext to desert the American States, 
New Vermont among the rest. " 

Yet, in a single act of the Legislature, there is a list of I 08 tories 
from twenty-nine towns. Half the men in Strafford and Thetford fled 
to Burgoyne — others repaired to the British on their march to Ben- 
nington. The expenses of war and government were, in a great part 
defrayed by the avails of tory estates, though sold at a sacrifice by 
auction. 

Records are not wanting of tories that were laid under bonds, or 
imprisonment, for concealing arms and ammunition, — for spying out 
the nakedness of the land and betraying it to the enemy ; of some 
that were banished — of others overtaken and killed as they were 
fleeing. The most unique punishment to which they were subjected 
was decreed by the Council at Bennington, in January, 1 778, after 
this fashion : " Let the overseer of the tories detach ten of them, 
with proper officers to take the charge, and march them in two distinct 
files, from this place, through the Green Mountains, for breaking a 
path through the snow. Let each man be provided with three days 
provisions. Let them march and tread the snow, in said road, of 
suitable width for a sleigh with a span of horses. Order them to return, 
marching in the same manner, with all convenient speed, ( 4. 32. ) 
Let them march at six o'clock tomorrow morning, " — early rising. 

The practice of confiscating the property of tories originated in 
Vermont, though it was imitated by most other States. In vain did the 
sufferers endeavor to take advantage of certain stipulations in their 
favor in the terms of Burgoyne's surrender. Our fathers decided that 



14 

none could be so benefitted but those who were at that time in his 
camp. Toryism snapped asunder the bands of society. It is said, "Trust 
ye not in any brother, for every brother may utterly supplant ". It tended 
to make life here what it was in France during the Reign of Terror — 
the infinite conjugation of the verb suspect. How many were 
wrongfully suspected ! How many were filled with revengefulness ! 

Our histories can never do justice to those to whom we owe our 
independence, till they tell us, as they have not yet done, how 
unfalteringly they braved intestine war — personal, as well as public 
enmity. 

Our histories relate few Indian depredations during the Revolution. 
The burning of, now and then, a single house — the capture of a few 
prisoners, usually two or three at a time, and the destruction of Royalton 
— are the substance of their accounts. There was little more to relate. 

But much more was to be expected and was expected. The Indians 
had desolated so many towns in New Hampshire and Massachusetts, 
and three times attacked the first settlement in Vermont, though in the 
extreme south of the State, — why should they not fall with redoubled 
fury and frequency upon those who were more in their neighborhood, 
and had even ventured as near them as New Haven and Newbury ? 
They were stimulated to attack our frontiers by Johnson's and Carlton's 
intrigues, and appeals to their hopes and their fears. They were 
enticed to the same enterprise by the arts of fugitive tories, burning for 
revenge and plunder — eager to show them the way to slaughter. 
Doubtless our possession of Ticonderoga, at first, and afterwards the 
cutting of Hazen's road, tended to curb their ravages ; but other circum- 
stances, though they have eluded the research of our historians, con- 
tributed, perhaps, even in a greater degree, to the safety of our 
frontiers. I will glance at one or two. As we have already seen, our 
preparations for defence were more efficient than represented in histories. 

At the outset of the Revolution Ethan Allen dispatched messengers 
to win over the Indians — at least, to neutrality. At the same time he 
sent them a characteristic letter in this style : 

" I know how to shoot and ambush like Indians. My foes stand all 
along close together, rank and file. My men and your men shall eat 
and drink together, and fight together against those who first began to 
kill us. If you wish to remain in peace, you need not fight. But come 



15 

and see us. I will give you whatever you want— bread, knives, 
tomahawks, paint, belts, blankets, money, rum." 

Thus and by other means, many Indians were induced to come to 
Newbury throughout the war, some to settle in that region — many to 
gel presents — many to trade, and some to enter our service as scouts 
and spies. 

Some of the Indian chiefs who come to Newbury were sent to 
Washington's army, and there treated with marked attention, as well 
to gain intelligence from them, as to convince them of our power and 
good will. Other chiefs furnished with a list of questions for which 
they were to procure answers, were sent as spies into Canada, and the 
intelligence thus procured was highly valued by Gates, Schuyler and 
Washington. On the whole, Indian incursions may not have done us 
more harm, than the information they furnished, as to the disposition of 
the Canadians, the forts, forces, reinforcements, supplies, measures and 
projects of the enemy did us good. 

Though a hundred letters are extant concerning our relations to the 
Indians at this time, I must content myself with one extract from one 
written by General Bailey at Newbury, many years after the close of 
the war : 

" I could not with safety leave the frontier where I was settled and 
join the army. I thought I could be of more service to our cause by 
securing an extensive frontier from the depredations of the Canada 
Indians, which by making friendship with them I effected, for at least 
200 



miles. 



" My exertions were such that I was watched and waylaid night and 
day, by the enemy from Canada — my house rifled, papers destroyed, 
son carried captive, and maltreated, only because he was my son, and 
would not discover to them how his father obtained intelligence of 
their movements. To the close of the war I was employed by 
Washington to keep friendship with the Indians, and gain intelligence 
of the enemy in Canada. " 

It has lately transpired that President Wheelock interceded in our 
behalf, with his former pupil, Brandt, the Indian chief, and that not 
without success. Moreover, proof is not wanting that the British 
Colonel Johnson was taken prisoner by John Warner, but released on 
condition of the Indians being restrained from Vermont. But our 



16 

frontier settlements, however safe, were by no means secure, — 
rather out of danger than free from apprehensions. One of our his- 
torians narrates a panic in Windham County ; — he might have spoken 
of another in Windsor County, when the inhabitants along White 
River fled, many of them by night, lighted by brands of fire, down 
the river to Lebanon ; and of another in Orange County, (4. 107.) 
when, says an eye witness, families are this moment rushing into 
Newbury, and for sixty miles they are upon a doubt whether to 
remove or not. 

Women yet live who can testify of such days when they lived in 
fear of the fate of Miss McRea, the bride of Ft. Edward, that Ger- 
trude of Wyoming in real life, — when every rustle of a shaken leaf 
seemed an Indian tread ; every tree an Indian covert — every window 
a mark for his rifle, every hamlet fully assured that it was singled out, 
above all others, as the victim of the savage. 

The relation sustained by our fathers to Indians and tories, as well 
as their defensive measures having been slightly noticed, and their 
conflicts against the British so blended with those of the Continentals, 
by our historians, — it is not too much to say that the part Vermont, 
took in the military exploits of the Revolution is yet to be written. 

I cannot speak as I would of the negotiations with the British in 
Canada, which turned the last two years of the war into diplomatic 
intrigues, but I must not pass them unnoticed. 

The right of Vermont to adopt policy for power, when Massachu- 
setts and New Hampshire were plotting a Poland-like partition of 
her territory, — when every continental soldier turned his back upon 
her, — when New York had no voice save to cry confiscation, — when 
an army as large as Burgoyne's was concentrating against her alone, 
can scarcely be doubted. But for such a course, the fate of Royalton 
would have been that of all her towns. 

Vermont would have yielded to Britain sooner than to New York. 
Some have hence taken occasion to say that Vermont was inclined to 
yield to Britain, as if because one evil is greater than another the less 
evil is a good, — as if because Andre prefered being shot to being 
hung we should infer that he wished to be shot. 

Our historians have not failed to refute this slander. They have 
also related how the negotiations with Canada drove Congress to 



17 

acknowledge the Independence of Vermont, and how they kept an 
army as large as Burgoyne's inactive. It might have been added, that 
a few soft words rendered repeated invasions, full of sound and fury, 
though carried as far as Burgoyne's, so fruitless, as to resemble oceans 
into tempests rocked to waft a feather, or to fulfil an old saying in a 
new sense — 

" The King of France with forty thousand men, 
Marched up a hill and then — marched down again. " 

The venerable Chipman, in the life of his yet more venerable 
brother, has broken a lance not without a wound, though in his old 
age, against the assailants of our leaders in their graves. From his 
reasoning it seems clear, that the Vermont diplomatists never, in all 
the armistice, professed loyalty to the crown, never lifted a finger to 
reconcile any man to it, and that nothing has been proved against 
them which is inconsistent with their avowed objects, namely, to keep 
the British army inactive, and to prevail upon Congress to vote the 
admission of Vermont into the Union as a 1 4th State. This sort of 
negative defence of the Green Mountain Chiefs is enough for their 
acquital. Another may be made of a more positive character by means 
of documents to which our historians do not seem to have had access. 

Years before, charges of toryism were brought against Vermont by 
those who were not authorized to cast the first stone, and whose 
principal reason for thinking her tory was that they had done so 
much to make her so. 

Our truce with Canada was rather a help than a hindrance to the 
last great struggle of the war — the operations against Cornwallis. It 
was either unknown to Washington or understood by him to be a 
political manoeuvre. In the midst of the armistice he wrote to Stark, 
commander in the northern department : " I doubt not that your 
requisitions to call forth the force of the Green Mountains will be 
attended with success." Requisitions, remember, to defend New York, 
their bitterest foe. Stark's reply was, that his requisitions Were attended 
with success, — that upon a sudden alarm five hundred and fifty 
mounted men from Vermont joined his troops in a few hours. Near 
the beginning of the armistice Schuyler had written to Washington: 
" It is believed, that large offers have been made the Hampshire Grants, 
but that nothing will induce the bulk of them to desert the common cause." 



18 

Washington was privy to the secret policy of Vermont for some 
time, — probably more than a month — before the surrender of Corn- 
wallis. This fact, stated but by one of our historians, seems to have 
been discredited by all the rest. It is established by a letter, long 
given up for lost, ( but recently discovered, ) and so alluded to by our 
historians as to excite suspicions that they had never seen it. Wash- 
ington, therefore, does not appear to have been perplexed by a 
British officer's apology for killing a Vermonter in a skirmish — an 
apology w^hich enraged Gen. Stark and filled Vermont itself from 
side to side, with a tempest of indignation. 

The only evil suggested by Washington as resulting from our 
diplomatic intercourse with the British was encouraging them to over- 
rate the proportion of tories among us. But what was this encourage- 
ment to that they would have taken from the conquest of Vermont, 
which, but for being amused with hopes, they would have accomplished? 
The one was shadow the other substance. The height of their 
expectation was not greater than the depth of their disappointment. 

The only remaining charge seems to be that our cabinet acted with 
bad faith toward the British. But, as the British were the chief sufferers 
by our policy, they would have been first to cry treason had there been 
any treason. They seem to have viewed themselves as worsted by 
their own weapon, diplomatic finesse. The falsehoods told them were 
not palpable, and will be judged tenderly by those who hold strata- 
gems are lawful in war, and that it cannot be wrong to deceive him 
whom it is right to kill. The Governor of Canada, not discouraged by 
failures, continued this pen and ink warfare, more years than Troy was 
besieged, and even sent to Burlington an envoy, who is plausibly 
supposed to have been his late Majesty, George the Fourth. 

Was it not then worth while for our leaders to make themselves of 
no reputation for a time, that without drawing a sword, without 
thwarting the plans of Washington, without injustice even to our 
enemies, they might avert the extremest peril ? Luther's words were 
half battles, theirs were more. 

In all our histories there is a lack of characteristic minutiae. We ask 
for face-to-face details, we receive far off generalties " where every 
something being blent together turns to a wild of nothing." 

Seemingly trifling particulars catch our eyes as we gaze at a 



19 

landscape ; they affect the eye-witnesses of events — they bring the light 
of other days around us as we listen to the narrative of old age ; — they 
are the sparkling fountains — abstractions are the vapid stream. 

Some writers may have neglected such fragments, deeming it beneath 
the dignity of history to stoop and gather them, as if history, like the 
Pope was never to be seen except gorgeous with trailing robes, or 
were to represent nations, as some picture books represent kings wear- 
ing crowns and holding sceptres — even in bed. So far as the suppres- 
sion of picture-like details has been a sin of ignorance, it is to be 
winked at, but not if it has proceeded from scorning them as nothing 
worth. Which of our historians might not profitably copy the following 
account of the evacuation of Ticonderoga, albeit it fell from the lips of 
a negro : — 

" About I 1 o'clock on Saturday night, orders were given by our 
Colonel to parade. We immediately obeyed. He then ordered our 
tents struck and carried to the battery. On doing this, the orders were 
to take up our packs and march, which we also did, passed the 
General's house on fire, marched 20 miles without a halt, and then had 
a brush with the enemy." 

How shall history hold the mirror up to nature if not by giving us 
the very words of the actors in bye gone times ? Things cannot indeed 
be all described, then the world would not contain the books which 
would be written, but those parts, the least as well as the greatest, 
should be sought out, which most nearly produce the effect of the whole. 

If the ballad writer be as influential as the legislator, why should our 
historians with one consent, refuse us, even in their notes and appen- 
dixes, a single specimen of the popular songs, the Marsailles hymns, 
— indicted by Rowley and others — sung at the crisis of our destiny. 

Can we learn as much in regard to common schools at an early day 
from any of our histories, as from a single remark made to me by a 
woman, who had no thought of telling any great thing, that in the 
winter of 1 780, her brother kept a school in one of the two rooms in 
his fathers log house in Sharon, there being then twenty-eight families 
in town and that there was no school for five winters afterwards ! 
Only two of the sixty-eight settlers in Bennington made their mark ; 
all of the 1 006 petitioners to King George wrote their names, and 
Elkins, a boy from Peacham, when a prisoner in England, receiving 



20 

a shilling a week from Dr. Franklin, paid out four coppers of it for 
tuition. 

Do not facts like these throw light upon the popular intelligence 
and desire of knowledge ? 

What incident in our histories shows the inspiriting effect of the 
Bennington battle so strikingly as a trifle they all omit, — a rumor which 
straightway ran through New Hampshire, that Burgoyne himself was 
taken at Stillwater, — coming events cast their shadows before. 

I would not willingly be ignorant that in I 764 there were only 
about 1 00 families between the mountains and the river — that a 
post-boat from Canada was taken soon after the seizure of Ticonderoga 
— that an express could be sent from Newbury to Boston in three 
days, cannon from Lake George to the same place in seventeen days 
— -that the Vermont Uniform was green with red facings — that rum 
even when it rose to $96, continental money, a gallon, was dealt out 
in the rations, — that Allen gave Warner 400 acres of land for cutting 
off the ear of a Yorker — that each Vermonter after the Bennington 
battle received $5 plunder money. Each of these trifles is a little 
window through which we can look into the distant past. 

The little said in our histories in relation to religion, tends to disprove 
the assertion of Dr. Dwight, that " our first settlers were chiefly univer- 
salists and infidels." There is much to disprove it in the following 
details. Orthodox ministers were early settled in most towns ; sermons 
longer than we can bear, and as searching were preached at the 
opening of every State Convention and Assembly ; — requests for 
prayers abound in letters, — -pamphlets then printed have beyond all 
comparison more allusions to the bible than to all other books together. 
When one would put General Bailey on his guard against tory liers- 
in-wait, he dropped in his path a paper with these words on it, " The 
Philistines be upon thee Samson. " 

The word of God was the law-book for all cases falling under no 
statute, and sentences were given according to its enactments. Where 
there was no church or preacher, meetings were held under trees and 
in private houses: such an assemblage delayed one day the burning 
of Royalton. My grand mother used to tell me that during the battle 
of Bennington, she and many others were met for prayer within the 
sound of cannon. 



^ 



21 

Our writers have not enough availed themselves of vivid particulars 
by w^ay of indirect description. 

What can give us a better idea what a long struggle was expected 
when hostilities begun, or how our people rushed to the war, than 
these words, written one week after the bloodshed at Lexington from 
that quarter to this. " For heaven's sake, pay the closest attention to 
sowing and planting ; do as much of it as possible, not for your own 
families merely. Do not think of coming down country to fight." 
What can draw and color more to the life the want of all things useful 
in war, during Burgoyne's invasion than these words of Stark, written 
at his quarters on the Connecticut : 

" I am informed that the enemy have left Castleton and have an 
intent to march to Bennington. We are detained here a good deal for 
bullet moulds, as there is but one pair in town, and the few balls sent 
on by the State go but a little way in supplying the whole." 

One pair of bullet moulds ! a light visible result significant of how 
many things not so visible. 

Such incidents, like the rude strokes in charcoal-sketches, produce 
more effect than many elaborate line engravings. 

The impressiveness of our history is weakened because a thousand 
petty circumstances are scattered here and there through a Gazetteer 
or through voluminous documents sometimes in widely sundered 
archives, like the elementary constituents of Mosaic work instead of 
being fitly framed together into a life-like picture, as those of the French 
Revolution have been by Carlyle. 

The heroic deeds of our forefathers seem not to have been appre- 
ciated ; sometimes they are mentioned as things of course, or unmen- 
tioned by our writers, though they are not a whit behind the chiefest 
deeds man can boast. 

Luther when the Pope burned his books, burned the Pope's bull. 
In what did he surpass Allen's retorting the setting a price on his head 
by New York, with setting the price on the head of a New York 
dignitary ? 

At Bennington, a Green Mountain Boy struck a Hessian officer's 
sword from his hand with a stick, and forced him to make his file of 
men lay down their arms. How few know that hero's name ! 

We shall always remember two men that swam the Hellespont, — 



22 

the one from vanity, the other for personal gratification of another sort. 
We are in danger of forgetting a citizen of our own who swam as 
broad a strait at Ticonderoga, at midnight, threading his way through 
a hostile fleet, not for himself but for his country, — Richard Wallace 
— worthy to bear the name of him of Scotland, and to be equalled 
with him in renown. 

I have sometimes thought our writers particularly oblivious of female 
heroism as displayed in our history. 

A French maid of honor who lost her arm by foolishly thrusting it 
in place of a door-bar to protect her queen, is eulogized. A woman of 
Vermont suffered the same loss, defending her husband, with the first 
weapon that offered against midnight kidnappers, and is passed over in 
silence. 

French women are praised for digging and trundling barrows to rear 
a monument of national fickleness. The similar labors of Vermont 
women striving to take the places of their husbands who were dying 
in battle are more than half forgotten. 

It is recorded in Scottish history that Knox's daughter would rather 
see him beheaded and catch her head in her apron, than have him 
turn papist. It is not recorded in our history what Vermont mother 
used her apron to staunch the blood of her wounded son, when both 
of them still every moment were exposed to be scalped. 

None of our histories mention the name of Hannah Handy, whose 
entreaties rescued not only her own children but seven of her neighbor's 
children from going into captivity, after they had been already taken 
over White River, and who dared to cross that river on the back of 
an Indian, that she might bring back her jewels. Yet was she a heroine 
before finding a parallel for whom we shall search long. 

But as annecdotes of Allen were eagerly coveted in his life time by 
distinguished Frenchmen, as we are learning that our curled maple and 
walnut may compare with mahogany, and that our marbles may vie 
with those of Carrara, which some have crossed an ocean to visit, so 
let us believe that heroes and heroines may not always be without 
honor in their own country, and in ours. Such seem specimens of the 
cardinal deficiencies in our histories as to our part in our histories of the 
Revolution, including our conflicts and our negociations with the 
British, as to minute details, and as to our heroes and heroines. 



23 

These deficiencies, and countless others in relation to topics on which 
I have no time to touch, have not only been clearly detected by our 
President, but his labors have accumulated materials for supplying very 
many of them. He has gathered together fragments from lake to river, 
from Massachusetts to Canada, — he has spent three months together 
in the collections of sister states, or of the general government ; he has 
secured correspondents in Canada, and in the person of his son, he has 
broken through the Chinese wall of English exclusiveness, — he has 
found laws and journals of the Legislature that have been given up for 
lost — he has doubled Thompson's list of Vermont books before its 
admission to the Union, — he has saved letters by thousands that were 
ready to perish, and that cast each its ray on the dark past. He has 
recently added a third to the ponderous tomes obtained of him by the 
State two years ago, — he has collected autographs, not to see which 
with more pleasure than Napoleon's would cast onimous conjecture on 
your patriotism, written in such a hand as was to be expected from 
pioneers, but who would look on letters of gold with half the pleasure ? 

Are all desiderata then supplied by the collections of our President ? 
By no means. Properly speaking he has had to do with only one 
department — military operations — and that during the Revolution. 
We ought to be thankful that he has magnified his office, yet not for- 
getful that he has exhausted none of the mines of investigation. A 
barrel full of papers left by the most interesting military character in our 
annals lies headed up and unexamined to this day. 

The collections of other societies and public offices, whether state, 
national or foreign, remain to be examined or re-examined. The 
papers of every man mentioned in our history are to be sought for, and 
in this search the name of every such man may prove a guide useful as 
a clue in a labyrinth. We must seek for sermons, histories, and 
biographies, hoards of newspapers, or those thrown away like autumnal 
leaves, journals in manuscript, letters sent out of the State to those from 
whom the settlers came forth. A rich mine of these is doubtless still 
unopened, for, among hundreds I have examined, I have discovered 
only two addressed to women, and none — no not one — written by a 
woman. But were not woman in those days ready writers even as 
now ? Proverbially the best letter-writers in all other countries, were 
they found wanting here? Did not their letters paint the lights and 



1 



24 

shades of life in this new State, as they have since portrayed western 
clearings, as those of busy men, less keen-eyed for the picturesque and 
trivial could not, or did not ? 

Other sources of historical facts will also be opened to us by lucky 
accidents, too various to be described or too strange to be predicted. 
The gems of sister societies were sometimes found where least looked 
for. The original of the world-famed ( English ) Magna Charta was 
found in the hands of a tailor, who was just ready to cut it up for 
patterns. One of the most ancient and valuable maps of New Hamp- 
shire, when it extended to the lake, was discovered in a storehouse 
where a pedler had left it when he removed his rags, either through 
accident, or judging it not worth taking away. 

What has been will be. 

If such a list of questions as that prepared by the Massachusetts 
society were circulated throughout Vermont, township by tovmship, 
beyond a doubt many early laws and journals of the Legislature, long 
ago given up as irrecoverably lost, as well as much equally valuable 
and more curious information concerning Town Committees and Com- 
mittees of Safety, those cradles of our independance, lacking links of 
every sort in the chains of our annals, might be rescued from oblivion. 

No doubt the drag-net of our research will gather of every kind. 
Criticism must therefore have its perfect work, in separating the precious 
from the vile. The mass of materials must also be classified according 
to their nature, the time to which they relate, the place where they 
were found, or the purposes for which they may be employed. 

Many explanatory notes must be appended to the collections made 
by our President, or what is a plain path to him will appear to those 
who shall come after, " a mighty maze and all without a plan." 

The fruits of our historical harvests and gleanings ought also to be 
garnered up in a chief place of concourse, instead of the corner where 
they are now secluded, — even as the treasures of other states are 
honored with archives in Boston, Hartford, Concord, New York and 
Washington. 

How beautiful thus to have a section of the past brought safe into 
the present and set down before your eyes ! 

Arrangements are making for publishing the earliest annals of our 
fathers. I trust such a publication will soon take away our reproach of 



25 

being the only State which has had a Society for a series of years and 
yet published nothing, as if our investigations were labor lost, or were 
to be hidden in the chaos of a Museum. 

The " Historical readings," published in the State Banner, were well 
received. Let us have more of them, a hundred fold. Let our printers 
whose types preserve knowledge, bring forth things old as well as new. 

What is of more interest than a town history — to each man that of 
his own town ? No where in Europe did I seek without finding one. 
How long shall we desire such histories in vain ? What true patriot 
loves not his own village ? 

Who can doubt the capacity of our primitive period to furnish an 
anthology of incidents suited for a reading book in common schools ! 
Such a book would have a greater charm for children than things far 
off and long ago. It might develop a spirit of research which must 
otherwise perish in embryo. Many an unique document which now 
appears to them as worthless as the jewel seemed to the barn-yard 
fowl, it might lead them to appreciate so that they would say, destroy 
it not, for a blessing is it. 

The only incident relating to our history, I remember in my school 
books, is Howe's captivity, and that was in a book long since anti- 
quated. Is there nothing, then, in our history such that we may fitly tell 
in the ears of our sons, and teach it diligently to our sons' sons ! 

As a means of securing the ends now suggested we may rejoice 
that we have a State Society, albeit as some think, it has but a name 
to live. Should we dispise its low estate, knowing that all begginnings 
are small ? Will it not be a rallying point, nay a magnet attracting to 
itself and binding in union all congenial spirits however scattered 
abroad ? Is it not suited to be their organ of communication with those 
like minded elsewhere ? Will it not increase their zeal, by kindling 
mutual emulation and by so dividing labors that each man shall have 
an office in keeping with his taste and opportunities. What better 
expedient can be devised to keep historical inquiries before the people, 
as well as to secure the co-operation and contributions of their thousand 
hands ? 

Is it not a nucleus, a reservoir into which rivulets without number, 
invaluable for its purposes though valueless as to all others, will naturally 
flow 7 



26 

Is it not a company for mutual insurance — not against fire — but 
against a loss which can never, by any possibility, be repaired ? 

An association, of such a nature and of such aims, should commend 
itself to us all. 

Statesmen ! Among your motives to scorn delights and live laborious 
days is the hope to leave a name that men shall not willingly let die — 
can you be indifferent to what concerns the memory of your predeces- 
sors ? Do to them as ye would that posterity should do to you. 

Politicians ! Will you not welcome our Society, as a little sanctuary 
where no war-whoop of party can be heard, — where the interests of 
all parties are one. If you look to dollars and cents, are researches to 
be sneered at, which by the papers of a single family have obtained 
nine pensions, and which may yet substantiate our claim to millions 
from the national treasury ? 

Scholars ! Can you remember that Massachusetts has published 
scores of volumes to illustrate her history, — that Connecticut, New- 
Hampshire, New York, and even Georgia have followed in her 
footsteps, and blush not that we are behind them all ? 

Ye that have spoken of plants even unto the hyssop that springelh 
out of the wall — that have chronicled every creeping thing that creepeth 
upon the face of the earth — can you pass by on the other side any 
memorial of the leaves in our history, as if tithing cummin were the 
weightiest of matters ? 

Rich men ! The British Museum has last year appropriated more 
than $20,000 to purchase books relating to America. Many of the 
rarest works on our local annals are led into captivity to London — 
materials, says one, for future Alison's to forge lies from. Will you 
only tighten your purse strings while men in deep poverty are strugling 
to secure for ourselves the documents which may be indispensible for 
refuting the half-truths, equivalent to whole falsehoods, which will be 
propounded, regarding our annals, by the party, or prejudiced writers 
of England ? 

Let us leave our history to be written by foreigners and it will be 
the play of Hamlet with the part of Hamlet omitted. The New York 
account of the taking of Ticonderoga is that " it was surprised by a 
detachment of provincials from Connecticut and Massachusetts Bay, " 
as if there had no Vermonter raised a finger. The truth is, as we 



27 

have seen, that the first measures for that capture originated in Vermont, 
and that all but one sixth of those engaged in it were Vermonters. 

Our ancestors made themselves of no reputation for you who had 
done nothing for them. No debt can be more binding on you than to 
see to it that justice is done their memory. 

Is there no hope of any further aid from the State ? Shall not this 
State, like so many others, perfect its archives, or shall the only State 
that redeemed its revolutionary paper money at par neglect to finish 
securing even its own laws and journals, and the records of its courts ? 

It is not fitting for the State's money to be laid out to help a man 
travel in England ; but it is a shame to us that we have not sooner 
secured the services of a gentleman who had gained access to the 
correspondence during the most critical period of our history, — docu- 
ments which others had in vain begged leave to examine — and who 
would have copied it cheaper and better than any other man. We 
have refused him hundreds though we might thus have procured a 
better reputation than we can now make of an aspersion which has 
been cast on the fame of our fathers. England is now lavishing 
thousands upon the same man for his assistance in obtaining documents 
in which she can feel comparatively but little interest. 

Even Georgia has procured the copying of twenty folios regarding 
her history in British public offices. 

The genius of our history says to us, all and each, that thou doest 
do quickly, like the sybil to the ancient king, she year by year brings 
with her fewer and fewer antique records, but unlike the sybil demands 
for them an even increasing price. 

I trust our Geological scrutiny will meet with no interruption or 
delay, but were we to leave that scrutiny half unfinished, another 
generation may renew it, and suffer no evil from our neglect. Geological 
records are always with us, everlasting as the hills, — they are graven 
on the rock forever, we may read them when we will. 

The records of our fathers have in part perished with them, — some 
of them live in the memories of patriarchs who still stand among us 
with eyes undimned and natural force not abated, as if on purpose 
that such as hold the pen of the ready writer may still embalm their 
sayings. For this end let each of us build over against his own house 
and rely on himself as though he were the only laborer. Let us redeem 



28 

the time, since if our old men pass away unquestioned, no buried 
Pompeii can be raised from the grave to enlighten our wilful ignorance. 
How we lack what we have lost irretrievably ! Many of you have 
stood in the Massachusetts Senate Chamber and seen suspended over 
the entramce, a gun, drum, sword and cap, trophies, not of Lexington, 
Concord, or Bunker Hill, but of Bennington. What would we not 
gfve to regain the simileir relic, — "those bruised arms hung up for 
monuments, " which we thro%v away as nothing worth. It is too late. 
But let us be up and doing, each in his own order. Every fact 
hitherto undetected, we can glean and gamer up by means of the art 
preservative of all arts, may be a monument more lasting than those 
trophies in Boston, or than any corruptible things, and what is more, 
vocal >vith speech that may be heard through all space and through all 
time. 




HENRY STEVENS 

First President of the Vermont Historical Society 



ACT OF INCORPORATION OF THE SOCIETY. 

It is hereby enacted by the General Assembly of the State of 
Vermont as follows : 

I St. Henry Stevens, of Barnet, in the County of Caledonia, and 
Oramel H. Smith, Daniel P. Thompson, and George B. Mansur, of 
Montpelier, in the County of Washington, — and such other persons as 
have associated, and may hereafter associate, themselves with them, for 
the purpose of collecting and preserving materials for the civil and 
natural history of the State of Vermont, — are hereby made a body 
corporate and politic, by the name of The Vermont Historical and 
Antiquarian Society; and, by that name, they, and their successors, 
may sue and be sued, and shall be capable in law to take and hold in 
fee simple, or otherwise, lands, and tenements, and rents and heredita- 
ments, not exceeding, in the whole, the yearly value of $2000.00, 
exclusive of the building or buildings, which may be actually occupied 
for the purposes of the said Corporation ; and they shall also be capa- 
ble, in law, to take, receive and hold, personal estate to an amount, the 
yearly value of which shall not exceed the sum of $2000.00, exclu- 
sive of the Books, Papers, Memorials, and other articles, composing the 
Library and Cabinet of the said Corporation ; and shall also have 
power to sell, demise, exchange, or otherwise dispose of, all, or part, of 
their lands, tenements, hereditaments, and other property, for the benefit 
of said Corporation ; and shall also have a Common Seal, which they 
may alter at their pleasure ; and shall also have the power to make By- 
Laws, with suitable penalties, not repugnant to the Laws of this State. 

2d. The said Corporation shall have power, from time to time, as 
they may think fit, to elect a President, and such other officers as they 
shall judge necessary ; and at their first meeting, they shall agree upon 
the manner of calling future meetings, and proceed to execute all, or 
any, of the powers vested in them by this act. 

3d. The Library and Cabinet of the said Corporation shall be kept 
in the town of Barnet, in the County of Caledonia. 

4th. The said Henry Stevens is authorized to notify the first meeting 
of the said Corporation, by an advertisement thereof, under his hand, for 
three weeks before such meeting, in any newspaper printed in this State. 

Approved Nov. 5, 1838. 



30 
FIRST MEETING OF THE 
Vermont Historical and Antiquarian Society, 

OCTOBER, 1840. 

Pursuant to an Act of the Legislature of Vermont, incorporating The 
Vermont Historical and Antiquarian Society, and empowering 
Henry Stevens to call the first meeting of said Society, the said Stevens 
having given the notice by said Act required, the several persons, in 
said Act incorporated, met at Montpelier on the third Thursday of 
October, A. D. 1 840, and elected— 

HENRY STEVENS, of Barnet. President. 
The same, " Librarian. 

D. P. Thompson, ] o ^ • 

Go R /I f secretaries, 

eo. D. Mansur, ) 

As officers of the said Society for the year ensuing; and Silas H. 
Jennison, E. A. Stansbury, I. F. Redfield, D. M. Camp, E. P. Walton, 
Daniel Baldwin, G. W. Benedict, Solo. Stodard, and Norman 
Williams, associate members ; and adopted the following 

CONSTITUTION AND BY-LAWS. 

Article 1 . There shall be a President and two Vice Presidents. It 
shall be the duty of the President, and, in his absence, one of the Vice 
Presidents, to preside in the meetings, and to regulate the debates of 
the Society and Council ; to call meetings of the Council, and extra- 
ordinary meetings of the Society, by advice of Council. The President, 
or presiding officer, shall vote in Council, and also have a casting vote. 
The Vice Presidents shall, ex-officio, be members of the Council. 

Art. 2. There shall be seven Counsellors, exclusive of the Presi- 
dent and Vice Presidents : any four of the whole number shall con- 
stitute a quorum. It shall be the duty of the Counsellors to direct the 
Corresponding Secretaries in the performance of their duty ; to present 
to the Society, for their acceptance, such regulations and by-laws as, 
from time to time, shall be thought expedient ; to receive donations, 
and, with the President, to purchase, sell or lease, for the benefit of the 
Society, real or personal estate ; to draw orders on the Treasury for 



31 

necessary monies, and, in general, to manage the prudential concerns of 
the Society. It shall be the duty of the Council to inquire concerning 
the characters of persons, living out of this State, proper to be elected 
Honorary Members. 

Art. 3. There shall be one Recording Secretary, and two Cor- 
responding Secretaries. The Recording Secretary shall be the keeper 
of the Seal of the Society. It shall be his duty to attend all meetings 
of the Society and Council, and to make and keep records of all their 
proceedings ; and shall keep on file all literary papers belonging to the 
Society, under direction of the Council. 

It shall be the duty of the Corresponding Secretaries to receive and 
read all communications made to the Society, and to manage, under 
the direction of the Council, all the correspondence of the Society. 

Art. 4. There shall be a Treasurer who shall give such security as 
the President and Council shall require for the faithful performance of 
his trust. It shall be his duty to receive and keep all monies and 
evidence of property belongmg to the Society ; to pay out to the order 
of the President and Council ; to keep a record of his receipts and 
payments ; exhibit the same to, and settle with, a committee which shall 
be annually appointed for this purpose ; and he shall put the money of 
said Society to interest under the direction of the President and 
Council. 

Art. 5. There shall be a Librarian and Cabinet Keeper, who shall 
give bonds to the satisfaction of the President and Council for the 
faithful performance of his trust. He shall receive and have in his 
custody all Books, Papers, Productions of Nature, and Works of Art — 
the property of the Society. These he shall arrange in classes, and 
register in a book with a proper description of each article, with the 
donor's name, when the same shall be a present. No article shall ever, 
on any occasion, be loaned or taken from the Museum ; nor shall any 
book or other article be borrowed from the Library, except by a vote 
of the Council, and then the loan of such article shall be recorded, and 
a receipt given therefor by the borrower, engaging to return the same 
in four weeks, or pay a forfeiture, such as by a vote of the Council shall 
be affixed. 

Art. 6. The stated meetings of the Society shall be — one in Barnet, 
on the I 7th day of January, and, when the same shall fall on Sunday, 



32 

then the Tuesday following ; one in Montpelier on the third Thursday 
in October, at such hours and places as shall be notified by the 
Secretary. At the annual meeting in Montpelier, in October, there 
shall be chosen, by ballot, all the officers of the Society to serve during 
the following year, and until others are chosen. At this meeting a 
public oration shall be delivered by some person to be appointed by 
the Council. 

Art. 7. All nominations for members shall hereafter be submitted to 
a committee of three for their approbation ; and, if approved by said 
committee, the names of the candidates, with the names of the mem- 
bers who proposed said candidates, shall be entered in the book of 
nominations, and the candidates may be balloted for at the next 
meeting of the Society. 

Art. 8. Each member shall annually pay into the hands of the 
Treasurer at the meeting, in October, $2,00 towards a fund. And 
every person who shall neglect to pay said annual tax, and shall suffer 
him or herself to be in arrear for three annual taxes, after having been 
called on by the Treasurer in person, or by written order, shall be 
considered as having abdicated his interest in the Society, and no 
longer a member. 

Art. 9. All meetings, standing or special, shall be notified by the 
Recording Secretary, under direction of the President and Council, in 
one newspaper, published in Montpelier, fourteen days previous to the 
day of the meeting, in which notification the hour and place of the 
meeting shall be designated. 

Art. 1 0. In case of the death, resignation, or removal out of the 
State, of either of the Secretaries, or the Treasurer, or Librarian, the 
Council shall take charge of the official books, papers and effects 
belonging to the vacated office, giving receipts for the same, which 
books they may deliver to some person whom they may appoint to fill 
the office until the next meeting of the Society, when there shall be a 
choice. 

Art. 1 I . This Constitution shall not be altered, or amended, except 
at the stated meeting in October, and then only by the vote of three- 
fourths of the members present. 



33 

BY-LAWS. 

I St. The ballots for the election of officers, and the admission of 
members, shall be collected by a committee chosen by nomination, who 
shall assort and count the votes and make report to the presiding 
officer ; and he shall declare the result to the Society. 

2d. Every member, w^ho shall advance $20 to the funds shall be 
excused paying the annual tax of $2. 

3d. Every new^ member shall be notified of his election by a 
printed letter signed by the Recording Secretary. 

4th. The Secretary shall record, in a book for this purpose, the 
names of the members, and the times of their admission. 

5lh. All books and other articles, belonging to the Society, shall 
be appraised, and the price of each article shall be mentioned in the 
catalogue. 

6th. A correct catalogue of the books, and other articles, shall be 
made out by the Librarian and Cabinet Keeper, or by a Committee 
chosen by the Society for this purpose, which copy shall be kept by 
the President for the time being ; and, as additions are made to the 
Library and Museum, they shall be entered on the Catalogue and copy 
thereof. 

7th. Every deed, to which the Common Seal of the Society is 
affixed, shall be passed and sealed in Council, signed by the President, 
and attested by the Secretary. 

8th. There shall be a temporary place of deposit in Montpelier, 
and in such other places as the Council shall hereafter direct, for the 
convenience of those who may be disposed to present to the Society 
any article for its Library and Museum. Every article so deposited, 
shall, as soon after as circumstances will permit, be forwarded to the 
Library and Museum in Barnet. 

SEVENTH ANNUAL MEETING. 

On the third Thursday of October, A. D. 1 846, the Vermont 
Historical and Antiquarian Society, agreeably to previous notice, held 
their seventh annual meeting at the Court House, in Montpelier ; when 
the meeting was called to order by the President, and the following 



34 

Officers of the Society were duly elected for the year ensuing, viz.: 

HENRY STEVENS, President. 

I. F. Redfield, 1 w. , 
S.B. Colby, i'^'^^do. 

D. P. THOMPSON, Recording Secretary. 
HENRY STEVENS, Librarian and Cabinet Keeper. 

D. BALDWIN, Treasurer. 

E. P. WALTON, \ 
S. H. JENNISON, / 

I. F. REDFIELD, ) Counsellors. 

D. M. CAMP, ( 

D. BALDWIN, j 
After which the Society adjourned to meet at the Brick Church, Oct. 
1 6, to hear an Address from Rev. J. D. Butler. 

D. P. THOMPSON, Secretary. 

October 16, 1846. 
Society met, and, the Legislature adjourning for the purpose, the 
members thereof assembled at the Brick Church, at 3 o'clock, P. M., 
when, the President and Secretary in the chair, Rev. J. D. Butler 
delivered an interesting address, illustrating the importance of preserving 
the fragmentary and unpublished history of Vermont ; at the close of 
which Rev. J. Gridley offered a resolution of thanks to Mr. Butler for 
his address — requesting a copy for the press — which was adopted ; 
and the meeting adjourned. 

The following declaration and accompanying papers were found by 
Mr. Stevens, at Washington among a mass of rubbish and were first 
published in the Burlington Free Press, the editor of which paper very 
justly remarks that the State is under great obligation to Mr. Stevens 
for his services in hunting up and arranging official papers and other 
testimony touching the origin, progress, and final consummation of the 
struggle, which resulted in giving to the American Switzerland the 
proud individuality of which we so justly boast. We hope to see the 
State do justice to itself, and to Mr. Stevens, by purchasing these 
papers, and putting them in a shape to make them available to the 
community at large. When this is done, the world will be satisfied that 
the early settlers of Vermont were men of no common mould. For a 
mere handful of men to resist the combined efforts of New York on 



35 

the one side, and New Hampshire on the other — to be repulsed, if not 
rejected by the home government, and menaced by a foreign foe, 
involved the exercise of no common sagacity, and an amount of nerve 
and energy, with which we are not familiar. But so it was. While 
maintaining an open war with the neighboring states, they protected 
the whole line of our frontier, by keeping on terms with the common 
enemy, while at (he same time they rendered more efficient aid to the 
government which discarded them than either of the States alluded 
to. The official correspondence with Washington — some of which is 
among these interesting papers — goes to demonstrate this, beyond a 
doubt. 

It is due the honor of the State that something be done to sustain 
Mr. Stevens in his untiring efforts to bring to light the records of a State 
whose early history is more remarkable than that of any other State of 
the Union. C. G. E, 

Vermont Declaration of Independence. 

" In Convention of the Representatives from the several counties and 
towns of the New Hampshire grants, holden at Westminster, January 
15, 1 777, by adjournment. 

Whereas, the Honorable the Continental Congress did, on the 4th 
day of July last, declare the United Colonies in America to be free and 
independent of the crown of Great Britain ; which declaration we most 
cordially acquiess in. And whereas by the said declaration, the arbi- 
trary acts of the crown are null and void, in America. Consequently, 
the jurisdiction by said crown granted to New York government over 
the people of the New Hampshire grants is totally dissolved. 

We therefore, the inhabitants, on said tract of land, are at present 
without law or government, and may be truly said to be in a state of 
nature ; consequently a right remains to the people on said Grants, to 
form a Government best suited to secure their property well being and 
happiness. We the delegates from the several counties and towns on 
said tract of land, bounded as follows : South on the north line of 
Massachusetts Bay ; East, on Connecticut River ; North on Canada 
line ; West as far as the New Hampshire Grants extends : After 
several adjournments for the purpose of forming ourselves into a distinct 



36 

separate State, being assembled at Westminster, do make and publish 
the following Declaration, viz : 

" That we will at all times hereafter, consider ourselves as a free and 
independent State, capable of regulating our internal police, in all and 
every respect whatsoever. And that the people of said Grants have the 
sole and exclusive, and inherent right of ruling and governing them- 
selves, in such manner and form as in their own wisdom shall think 
proper, not inconsistent or repugnant to any resolve of the Honorable 
Continental Congress. 

Furthermore, we declare by all the ties which are held sacred among 
men, that we will firmly stand by and support one another in this our 
declaration of a State, and endeavoring as much as in us lies to sup- 
press unlawful routs and disturbances whatever. Also we will endeavor 
to secure to every individual his life, peace and property, against all 
unlawful invaders of the same. 

Lastly, we hereby declare, that we are at all times ready, in con- 
junction with our brethren in the United States of America, to do our 
full proportion in maintaming and supporting the just war, against the 
tyrannical invasions of the ministerial fleets and armies, as well as any 
other foreign enemies, sent with express purpose to murder our fellow 
brethren, and with fire and sword to ravage our defenceless country. 

The said State hereafter to be called by the name of New 
Connecticut." 

Extracts from the minutes. 

IRA ALLEN, Clerk 



In Convention of the Representatives from the several counties and 
towns in the New Hampshire Grants holden at Westminster, 15th 
January I 777, by adjournment. Voted unanimously, 

That it is the ardent wish of this Convention that each town in the 
District would send a Delegate or Delegates, to the next sitting of this 
Convention, those towns that have not chose any Delegates to choose 
and send. This Convention is adjourned to the first day of June next, 
to be held at the Meeting House in Windsor, at nine o'clock in the 
morning. 

Extracts from the minutes. 

IRA ALLEN, Clerk. 



37 

*#* Non-residents that have a desire to attend the above Conven- 
tion, are hereby notified of the same, said Convention was formed to 
govern the Internal Police of said District, and if thought proper, to 
form said District into a State. 



''■} 



STATE OF VERMONT, 
In General Convention, Windsor, June 4, 1 777. 

Whereas, this Convention, did at their session in Westminster, the 
I 5th day of January last, among other things, declare the district of 
land commonly called and known by the name of the New Hampshire 
Grants, to " be a free and independent State, capable of regulating 
their own internal police in all and every respect whatsoever, and 
that it should be known thereafter by the name of New Connecticut. " 

And whereas, by mere accident, or through mistake, the said 
declaration alone, was published in the Connecticut Courant, No. 634, 
dated March the 17th, 1777, without assigning the reasons which 
impelled the inhabitants to such separation. 

And whereas, this Convention have been informed that a district 
of land lying on the Susquehanah River, has been heretofore and is 
now known by the name of New Connecticut, which was unknown 
to them until some time since the declaration at Westminster aforesaid ; 
and that it would be inconvenient in many respects for two separate 
districts on this continent to bear the same name ; 

Resolved, therefore, unanimously, that the said district described in 
the preamble to the declaration at Westminster, aforesaid, shall ever 
hereafter be called and known by the name of Vermont. 

And whereas, the whole body of members which compose this 
Convention, consisting of the following persons, viz : Captain Josiah 
Bowker, President; Nathan Clarke, Esq., Mr. Simeon Hatheway, 
Mr. John Burnam, jun., Jonas Fay, Secretary ; Major Jeremiah Clark, 
Mr. Abel Olia, Captain Ebenezer Willoughby, Mr. Abel Benedict, 
Mr. Joseph Bradley, Mr. Ely Bronson, Mr. Martin Powell, Mr. 
Thomas Bull, Mr. Cephas Kent, Mr. Moses Robinson 2nd., Dr. 
Gains Smith, Captain William Fitch, Captain Jonathan Willard, 



38 

Mr. Caleb Smith, Capt. Zebediah Dewey, Mr. Jesse Churchill, 
Captain William Gage, Captain Ebenezer Allen, Benjamin Spencer, 
Esq., Mr. Whitefield Foster, Mr. Joseph Smith, Mr. Stephen Pince, 
Mr. John Southerland, Captain Jonathan Fassett, Captain Josiah 
Powers, Captain Jeremiah Powers, Mr, Gamaliel Painter, Captain 
Heman Allen, Captain Ira Allen, Colonel Thomas Chittenden, Mr. 
William Miller, Dr. William Hall, Col. Benjamin Carpenter, Captain 
John Barnet, Mr. Israel Smith, Mr. John Dyer, Mr. Dennis Locklin, 
Nathaniel Robinson, Esq., Mr. Joshua Webb, Dr. Reuben Jones, 
Mr, Jabez Seargeants, Captain John Coffin, Captain William Udly, 
Mr. Ebenezer Hoisington, Captain William Curtiss, Major Joel 
Mathews, Captain William Gallop, Mr. Benjamin Emmons, Mr. 
Stephen Tilden, Col. Joseph Marsh, Mr. John Troop, John W. 
Dana, Esq., Mr. Asa Whitcomb, Mr. Asa Chandler, Col. Peter 
Alcott, Major Thomas Murdock, Mr. Jacob Burton, Joel Marsh, 
Esq., Mr. Daniel Gilbert, Mr. Abner Chamberlain, Mr. Frederick 
Smith, Mr. Amos Woodworth, Mr. Amabiah Woodworth, Dr. Bil- 
dad Andress, Mr. Benjamin Baldwin, Mr. John G. D. Bailey, Captain 
Robert Johnston, — amounting to seventy-two in number, being all 
convened at the town house in Windsor, aforesaid, and the motion 
being made and seconded, whether the house would proceed to 
business on the former declaration made at Westminster, in January, 
aforesaid, with this alteration only, that instead of New Connecticut, 
the said district should ever be known by the name of Vermont ? 
That then the name of the representatives being distinctly and severally 
called by the Secretary, seventy-one of them did answer in the follow- 
ing, viz, " proceed to form ; " at which time and place the said seventy- 
one members did renew their pledges to each other by all the ties held 
sacred among men, and resolve and declare that they were at all 
times ready in conjunction with their brethren in the United States, to 
contribute their full proportion towards maintaining the present just 
war against the fleets and armies of Great Britain. 

That the public may be capable of forming a just idea of the 
reasons which so necessarily obliged the inhabitants of the district 
before described, to declare themselves to be separate and distinct 
from the State of New York, the following complaints are hereto 
subjoined. 



39 

COMPLAINTS. 

In the year 1 764, the Legislative authority of New York did 
obtain jurisdiction over the before described territory of land, by virtue 
of a false representation made by the late Lieut. Governor Colden, 
that for the convenience of trade and administration of justice the 
inhabitants were desirous of being annexed to that Government. 

They have refused to make re-grants of the same lands to the original 
proprietors and occupants, unless at the exhorbitant rate of $2300 
fees for each township, and did enhance the quit rent three fold, and 
demanded an immediate delivery of the title derived before from New 
Hampshire. 

The Judges of their Supreme Court have made a solemn declaration, 
that the charters, conveyances, &c., of the lands included in the before 
described premises, were utterly null and void, on which said title was 
founded. 

In consequence of which declaration, writs of possession have by 
them issued, and the Sheriff of the County of Albany sent at the head 
of six or seven hundred armed men to enforce the execution thereof. 

They have passed an act annexing a penalty thereto, of thirty 
pounds, five and six months imprisonment, on any person, who should 
refuse attending the sheriff after being requested for the purpose of 
executing writs of possession. 

The Governors, Dunmore, Tyron and Colden, have made re-grants 
to several tracts of land included in the premises, to certain favorite 
land-jobbers in the Government of New York, in direct relation of 
his Britanic Majesty's special orders in the year 1 767. 

They have endeavored and many times threatened to excite the 
King's troops to destroy us. 

They have issued proclamations wherein they have offered large 
sums of money for the purpose of apprehending those persons who 
have dared boldly and publicly to appear in defence of their just 
rights. 

They did pass twelve acts of outlawry on the 9th of March, A. D. 
1 774, empowering the respective Judges of their Supreme Court, to 
award execution of death against those inhabitants in said district, that 
they should judge to be offenders, without trial. 



40 

They have and still continue an unjust claim to those lands, which 
greatly retards emigration into, and the settlement of this State. 

They have hired foreign troops, emigrants from Scotland, at different 
times, and armed them to drive us out of possession. 

They have sent the savages on our frontiers to destroy us. 

They have proceeded to erect the counties of Cumberland and 
Gloucester, and established courts of justice there, after they were 
discountenanced by the authority of Great Britain. 

The Free Convention of the State of New York, at Harlem, in 
the year 1776, unanimously voted, "that all quit-rents formerly due 
to the King of Great Britain, are now due and owing to this Conven- 
tion, or such future government as shall be established in this State. " 

To give truth its due limits, they, the late government of New York, 
have spared neither cost or pains, nor been wanting in using every 
artful insinuation within the compass of their power ; ( however 
unwarrantable by the laws of God or man,) to defraud those inhabitants 
out of the whole of their landed property ; and nothing but consciences 
void of offence towards God and man, to whose impartial judgment we 
appeal, could have induced those inhabitants to have run the risk, and 
to have undergone the hardships and fatigues they have borne, for the 
salvation of their lives, liberties and properties. 

In the several stages of the aforesaid oppression, we have petitioned 
his Britannic Majesty in the most humble manner for redress, and 
have at a very great expense, received several reports in our favor: 
and in other instances wherein we have petitioned the late Legislative 
authority of New York, these petitions have been treated with neglect. 
We shall therefore only remind the public that our local situation alone, 
is a sufficient reason of our declaration of an independency, and must 
therefore denounce a separation from the State of New York, and 
refer the public to our declaration of being a distinct State, published 
in the Connecticut Courant the 1 5 th day of January last, and sincerely 
wish, that in future a lasting and permanent peace may continue between 
the State of New York and this with the other United States of 
America. 

By order of Convention, 
JONAS FAY, Secretary. 



41 

"The Song of the Vermonters," 1779.* 

Ho — all to the borders ! Vermonters, come down, 
With your breeches of deer-skin, and jackets of brown ; 
With your red woolen caps, and your moccasins, come 
To the gathering summons of trumpet and drum. 

Come down with your rifles ! let gray wolf and fox 
Howl on in the shade of their primitive rocks ; 
Let the bear feed securely from pig-pen and stall ; 
Here's a two-legged game for your powder and ball. 

On our South come the Dutchman, enveloped in grease ; 
And, arming for battle, while canting of peace ; 

* The political history of Vermont is full of interest. In I 762, New 
York, by reason of an extraordinary grant of Charles II. to the Duke 
of York, claimed a jurisdiction over about sixty townships of which 
grants had been given by the Governor of New Hampshire, declaring 
those grants illegal. An attempt was made to dispossess the settlers, but 
it was promptly resisted. In 1 774, New York passed a most despotic 
law against the resisting Vermonters, and the Governor offered a large 
reward for the apprehension of the celebrated Ethan Allen, and 
seven of his associates. The prescribed persons in turn threatened to 
"l^ill and destroy any person or persons whomsoever that should be 
accessary, aiding or assisting in taking any of them." See Allen's 
X)indication, p. 45. Blood was shed at Westminster Court House, 
in 1775. Vide. R. Jones' Narrative. In 1777 Vermont declared 
its independence. New York still urged her claims and attempted to 
enforce them with her militia. In 1779, New Hampshire also laid 
claim to the whole State of Vermont, Massachusetts speedily followed 
by putting in her claims to about two-thirds of it. Congress, powerless 
under the old Confederation, endeavored to keep on good terms with 
all the parties, but ardently favored New York. Vermont remonstrated 
warmly. Congress threatened. Vermont published " an appeal to the 
candid and impartial world " — denounced Congress, and asserted its 
own absolute independence. Notwithstanding the threats offered on 
all sides, the contest terminated without much bloodshed, and Vermont 
was admitted into the Union in I 79 1 , after existing as an indepen- 
dent sovereignty for nearly fifteen years. — Williams' History of 
Vermont. &c. 



42 

On our East, Crafty Meshecht has gathered his band, 
To hang up our leaders, and eat cut our land. 

Ho — all to the rescue ! For Satan shall work 
No gain for his legions of Hampshire and York ! 
They claim our possessions, — the pitiful knaves — 
The tribute we pay, shall be prisons and graves ! 

Let Clinton and Ten Broek,+ w^ith bribes in their hands. 
Still seek to divide us, and parcel our lands ; — 
We've coats for our traitors, whoever they are ; 
The warp is of feathers — the filling of tar ! s 

Does the " old bay state " threaten ? Does Congress complain ? 

Swarms Hampshire in arms on our borders agam ? 

Bark the war-dogs of Britain aloud on the lake ? 

Let 'em come ; — what they can, they are welcome to take. 

What seek they among us ? The pride of our wealth 
Is comfort, contentment, and labor and health, 
And lands which, as Freemen, we only have trod. 
Independent of all save the mercies of God. 

Yet we owe no allegiance ; we bow to no throne ; 
Our ruler is law, and the law is our own ; 
Our leaders themselves are our own fellowmen. 
Who can handle the sword, or the scythe, or the pen. 

Our wives are all true, and our daughters are fair. 

With their blue eyes of smiles, and their light flowing hair ; 

t Hon. Meshech Weare, Governor of New Hampshire. 

t Gov. Clinton of New York, and Hon. A. Ten Broek, President 
of the New York Convention, 

§ The New York sheriffs and those who submitted to the authority 
of New York were often roughly handled by the Green Mountain 
Boys. The following is from the journal of the proceedings of the 
Vermont Council of public safety : Council of Safety, 3d Sept. 1 777. 

" is permitted to return home, and remain on his 

father's farm ( and if found off to expect thirty-nine lashes of the beach 
seal) until further orders from this Council. " The instrument of pun- 
ishment was termed the " beach seal, " in allusion to the great seal 
of New Hampshire affixed to the grants, of which the beach rod 
well laid upon the naked backs of the " Yorkers " and their adherents 
was considered a confirmation. 



43 

All brisk at their wheels till the dark even-fall, 
Then blithe at the sleigh-ride, the husking, and ball ! 

We've sheep on the hillsides ; we've cows on the plain ; 
And gay-tasseled corn-fields, and rank growing grain ; 
There are deer on the mountains ; and wood-pigeons fly 
From the crack of our muskets, like clouds on the sky. 

And there's fish in our streamlets and rivers, which take 
Their course from the hills to our broad-bosomed lake ; 
Through rock-arched Winooski the salmon leaps free, 
And the portly shad follows all fresh from the sea. 

Like a sun-beam the pickerel glides through his pool ; 
And the spotted trout sleeps where the water is cool, 
Or darts from his shelter of rock and of root 
At the beaver's quick plunge, or the angler's pursuit. 

And ours are the mountains, which awfully rise 

Till they rest their green heads on the blue of the skies ; 

And ours are the forests unwasted, unshorn. 

Save where the wild path of the tempest is torn. 

And though savage and wild be this climate of ours. 
And brief be our seasons of fruits and of flowers, 
Far dearer the blast round our mountains which raves, 
Than the sweet summer zephyr which breathes over slaves. 

Hurra for Vermont ! for the land which we till 
Must have sons to defend her from valley and hill ; 
Leave the harvest to rot on the field where it grows, 
And the reaping of wheat for the reaping of foes. 

Far from Michiscoui's wild valley, to where 
Poosoomsuck steals down from his wood-circled lair, 
From Shocticook river to Lutterlock town, — 
Ho — all to the rescue ! Vermonters, come down ! 

Come York or come Hampshire, — come traitors and knaves ; 
If ye rule o'er our land, ye shall rule o'er our graves ; 
Our vow is recorded — our banner unfurled ; 
In the name of Vermont we defy all the world ! II 

II " Rather than fail, I will retire with my hardy Green Mountain 
Boys to the desolate caverns of the mountains, and Wage war with 
human nature at large. " — Ethan Allen s Letter to Congress, March 
9, 1784. 



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